Toni Dimaano Science 11.09.2022 02:Nov AM EST

Albert Einstein Won the Nobel Prize in Physics on This Day in 1922

It has been a whole 100 years since Albert Einstein won his Nobel Prize in Physics for his expansion of the photoelectric effect in 1922 at only 26 years old.

While everyone was expecting the genius to win the prize for his theory on relativity, it was his idea on what is behind today's solar energy revolution that earned him the well-coveted merit.

What Was This Award-Winning Photoelectric Effect Explanation

According to The Atlantic, even from the beginning of the turn of the century, scientists already had an idea that light could produce electric current once exposed to certain conditions.

However, despite this observation, no one really understood why light could create electricity since it was then understood that light worked as a wave.

With this contradiction, in 1905, Einstein produced a paper that suggested that light was not a wave but was something discontinuously distributed in space.

According to his explanation of the photoelectric effect, light is spread out and scattered from a point source but is consisted of energy quanta localized at different points in space.

This means that Einstein believed that light behaved like a particle rather than a wave, which is why it can create electric current.

The Nobel Prize Organization adds that photoelectric explains that if metal electrodes are exposed to light, sparks will actualize between them.

For this to happen, light waves would be at a certain frequency, and the light's intensity should be critical for it to work.

This discovery was what warranted Einstein to win the Nobel Prize in 1922, a year after no one won the Nobel Prize in 1921.

According to the Nobel Prize Organization, during the committee's selection process for Physics, they found that nobody met the criteria outlined by the foundation and reserved the 1921 prize for next year.

This made Einstein the 1921 Nobel Prize winner in the field of Physics in the year 1922.

Many Thought That Einstein's Nobel Prize Was For The Theory Of Relativity

Contrary to popular belief, despite the theory of relativity being Einstein's most well-known contributions to science, it was what won him the Nobel Prize.

According to Advanced Science News, while he came up with the theory of relativity and the photoelectric effect explanation, Einstein was only awarded for the latter.

The reserved Nobel Prize of 1921 was awarded to Einstein the next year for "his services to theoretical physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of photoelectric effect," reports say.

The decision prompted speculations from left and right, relating the controversy to the access that was granted to the official archival materials at the organization.

However, Advanced Science New writes that Einstein not winning an award for his theory of relativity might have been just a case of bias, arrogance, and pettiness among committee members at the time.

In 1954, almost 50 years after the scientist won the award for his contribution to the law of photoelectric effect, solar cells were created to run electrical equipment.

These solar cells have later been developed into the solar energy people use in modern technology today, proving that addressing a gap in knowledge can lead to something useful, The Atlantic writes.